Ed Balls comes out fighting with attack on 'reckless gamble' over economy

Ed Balls, the new shadow chancellor, claimed on Saturday that the government's "reckless gamble" of massive spending cuts was already harming the economy as the country headed for high unemployment, lower mortgage lending and slower growth.

Balls, who was promoted last week after the surprise resignation of Alan Johnson, showed signs of a newly combative approach as he claimed that the coalition had turned a promising economic outlook into a gloomy one by pushing through "the fastest, deepest deficit reduction in Britain's peacetime history".